Capabilities rolling out in February 2024

Summary

• Improve Revalidation when changes external to the rules are made

• Redesign of the Rule Designer canvas

• New Metric Counter Public templates

General

Better conformity on name validation

The validation of names of items in the user interface and the backend did not always match. We have made the validation consistent between the two validation areas.

Theming

Alterian CX allows the choice between three themes in the user interface. The default was set as the dark theme and this was jarring for users who were used to the standard light theme. We now take the browser (Chrome) theme and use this to guide us on the default to use. If users are using the dark theme in Chrome we will use the dark theme as default and the same with the light theme.

You can change the theme at any time and we will honour and remember the decision.

Rule snoozing to optimise performance

So our systems remain as performant as possible we will now automatically snooze rules that are not “used” over a 60 day period. Rules in a snoozed state can still be called. The first call after snoozing will unsnooze the rule, after this the rule will work as normal if activity continues over the 60 day period, If not it will snooze again. More details can be found here.

Rule Designer

Rename “Realtime Inputs” in Realtime Input Step

In the Realtime Input step we previously had “Realtime Inputs.” In truth these are set by Query Parameters or headers coming into the Rule. In the Test Runner Screen we call the setting of these values Query Parameters. We’ve changed the naming to be consistent and will now name both Query Parameters.

Revalidation of a Rule

While you are working on a rule in rule designer it’s possible for external changes to be made to that rule that will impact how it behaves and whether it will work at all. Previously these changes would not show in Rule Designer until the user exited and then re-entered rule designer when we would revalidate the rule.

We have now changed the behaviour to provide the user with more information on the changes that occur and to allow the user to react to them.

The changes below will cause a popup to occur. In each case the popup will highlight the change that has occurred.

• Rule Status - Running, Stopped, Paused

• Linked Rules - Rules linked to the Tiles in the Rule. We inform the user whenever the linked rules status changes or when they no longer exist, the linked rule is deleted

• Global Parameter changes - We will highlight the parameter that has changed.

Improved Alterian Email Manager Integration

We have redesigned the deployment creation wizard in our Rule Designer Email Manager integration. The major improvement is the addition of a Variable Mapping tab as the final part of the wizard. In previous versions we relied on the field mapping to map fields to variables but this had limitations when creating email deployments. The dedicated variable mapping screen provides greater functionality than before including the ability to see default values and the ability to map a field to more than one variable. To see more details on the changes find out more here.

Rule Designer Canvas

The Rule Designer Canvas has been updated to allow the following:

• Select and then move multiple tiles to improve Rule structure

  • You can select by simply clicking tiles one by one or clicking and dragging a box to select tiles of interest

• Select and delete multiple tiles

We now have a new “Move Mode” indicated by a hand at the bottom right of the canvas. This allows you to move the entire rule within the Canvas to provide more room.

We also now provide “Canvas help” that highlights the various keyboard shortcuts that are now available to users.

Parameters screen redesign

The Parameters screen has been updated and redesigned to make it easier to use. The separate “open” existing parameter button has been removed. Instead a user can right click on the url and choose to open in the same page or a new tab. Parameter editing has been improved with larger editing boxes.

Test Runner

Allow a test to be run with trace logging off

Test runner previously provided logging at a tile and step level. Although both of these options are useful when reviewing a rule they do not represent the logging that would occur when the rule is running in production. You can now choose to turn the trace option off which accurately reflects the logs generated by a rule in production.

Test Descriptions in Test Runner

Tests within Test Runner have a description box where a user can add a description of the test and possibly the expected results. Users were keen to be able to see a description while also reviewing the test request.

We will now show the description from the tab in the test list screen. Where the description is long we will provide ellipses and a tooltip so the full description can be seen.

Query Parameters

The Query Parameters section in the Request tab has been updated. We now provide bigger text boxes to make it easier to add and edit values. We will also now show the default query parameters that are created automatically for each rule. Only the user created query parameters previously showed in this tab.

Rules

We have added a recently used Rules section to the Rules screen. It shows the last seven rules you as a user have used in order or recency left to right. This recently used section sits above the normal filters, this is per design as the filters do not control the rules that show in this section.

This recently used Rules section can be toggled open and closed to ensure the Rules grid below maintains it’s size if the recently used rules are not the focus of the work being done.

This new design has also replaced the recently used functionality in Journey Playbooks and Journey Analytics.

Public Templates

Metric counter and Metric Reader Public templates

Allows our users to “count” a field occurrence over two date ranges (Hours and Days) and then have a separate public template to read the values back out. Any field can be counted. The original driver for this was to allow our customers to create rules that could control the number of emails set to customers.

Email and Social Input no longer creates Channelagentids

This template used to create channelagentid1 which was commonly required in the past. Users can now define the fields that identify individuals and therefore channelagentids are no longer required and have been removed. We now pass the default emailAddress field through which is one of our standard identification fields.

Email manager input public template

The Rule Designer Email Manager integration has been updated. The main change is the addition of a new Variable Mappings tab in the deployment creation wizard. Previously we mapped fields in using the standard field mapping functionality. More details on the new integration can be found here.

API

The Logs API now has a searchQuery option that will take a lucene query. We are splitting the logs we produce into separate fields to take advantage of this. This should allow specific searches in the logs to be much more performant.

Steps

Alterian Queue now has optional TTL when reading values

The Alterian Queue allows you to automatically append data stored in a single table to the event being created. Alterian currently uses this to append your Persona and Customer Attribute values to the events created. In the previous release we set a TTL of eighteen months whenever the Alteiran Queue step was used.

This has now been changed at a step level to allow the choice of the TTL length and whether to set the TTL to both be optional.

Cache step can now output the field value after writing

Our template designers often use the cache step in a “write-then-read” pattern. They want to write a value and then immediately use the updated value in the flow of the rule.

As this is a common process we have changed the cache step to optionally output the value when a value is written. With “write” selected simply choose the field to write the value into by using the drop down box.

Process Future Event step now creates a sequence number

In the past the lack of a sequence number in rules started by a Process Future event meant that some other steps could not be used. A sequence number is now created allowing these steps to be used.

Standard Kettle “Memory Group by” step now supported

The "Memory Group by" is a step used in transformations to group rows of data based on specified fields without the need to rely on a database.

The "Memory Group by" step allows you to group data in memory, meaning that the grouping operation occurs within the process without the need to perform the grouping operation in a database. This can be useful when working with smaller datasets that can comfortably fit into memory.

This step was not previously supported in Alterian Journey Orchestration but is now.

Alterian Split Fields step

We've introduced a new Alterian "Split Fields" step, providing the capability to break down a field's value into multiple fields according to a designated delimiter or pattern.

This step mirrors the functionality of the existing Kettle "Split Fields" step, with a notable enhancement—the incorporation of a "Remove Enclosures" option. When selected, this feature removes enclosures from the resulting fields, offering added flexibility and control in your data rules.

Realtime Input allows choice of Content type

Users creating a Realtime Input can now optionally highlight the content type of the data expected.

Journey Analytics

There are no new Journey Analytics features in this release.

Fixes

Known Issues

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